Results tagged “AIPAC” from SpyTalk

AIPAC Spy Figure Larry Franklin Describes Mafia-Style Murder Threat

By Jeff Stein | July 1, 2009 9:47 PM | | Comments (0)

Somebody wanted Larry Franklin out of the way. 

In court documents filed last week, a sketchy tale surfaced suggesting that someone wanted Franklin, the former Pentagon analyst who had agreed to testify against two pro-Israel activists on charges of espionage, dead.

In a Tuesday, June 30 interview, Franklin and his attorney Plato Cacheris, the famed criminal defense lawyer, elaborated on the shadowy incident.

"Somebody approached Larry and suggested it would be good if Larry could disappear and fake a suicide," Cacheris said, "and this person would assist him in doing that."
 
Franklin didn't take it that way: It was more like a page out of The Sopranos, which would end with him disappearing -- forever.

Tags: AIPAC, espionage, FBI, Israel, Keith_Weissman, Larry_Franklin, murder, Plato_Cacheris, Sopranos, spy_scandal, Steven_J._Rosen

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Israel 'Spy Scandal' Figure Larry Franklin Breaks Silence

By Jeff Stein | July 1, 2009 7:24 PM | | Comments (2)

He insists he did it for his country, to head off a disastrous U.S. invasion of Iraq. 

But instead, Pentagon analyst Larry Franklin found himself charged with giving classified information to suspected agents of Israel. In 2006 he was sentenced to almost 13 years in prison and a $10,000 fine, later reduced to probation and 10 months house arrest for cooperating with the feds. 

Today, the former Iran specialist is mopping floors at a Roy Rogers near his home in West Virginia and serving a 100 hour community service sentence at a halfway house for abused children

Now, breaking silence for the first time since he became entangled in the Israel-spy-ring-that wasn't, Franklin says he gave sensitive information to a pro-Israel lobbyist in hopes that it would be passed on to the White House.

Tags: AIPAC, espionage, FBI, Israel, Israeli_lobby, Keith_Weissman, Larry_Franklin, Steven_J._Rosen

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Harman Comes Out Swinging Once More in Israel Wiretap Flap

By Jeff Stein | June 25, 2009 4:46 PM | | Comments (2)

Rep.  Jane Harman, D-Calif, who was reportedly overheard on a 2005 NSA wiretap agreeing to lobby Bush administration officials on behalf of two accused Israeli agents, released a letter from the Department of Justice today that she says clears her of any wrongdoing. 

"It states I am not a target or subject of an investigation," a press release from Harman's office said. "This reaffirms similar information I received in early 2007 following initial unsubstantiated leaks."

But in claiming absolution from the Justice Department, Harman has continued a public relations tack of effectively denying something she was never charged with.

Tags: AIPAC, criminal_defense_lawyer, electronic_spying, electronic_surveillance, FISA, Jane_Harman, Justice_Department, NSA, Public_Integrity_Section, Reid_Weingarten, wiretap

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AIPAC Verdict Sure to Fuel More Harman Conspiracy Theories

By Jeff Stein | May 1, 2009 10:25 AM | | Comments (2)

The Justice Department's decision to drop espionage charges against two pro-Israel lobbyists will certainly pour jet fuel on conspiracy theories burning up the blogosphere over the Jane Harman wiretap controversy.

Tags: AIPAC, CIA, espionage, FBI, Israel, Israeli_lobby, Jane_Harman, Justice_Department, Porter_J._Goss, spies

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Embattled Harman Challenges Columnist to Road Race

By Jeff Stein | April 29, 2009 3:08 PM | | Comments (3)

Embattled California Rep. Jane Harman, D-Calif., shrugged off woes over a wiretapping controversy Wednesday and claimed "Best Team Name Honors" for this year's Capital Challenge mini-marathon race.

"Tapped Out," an obvious reference to revelations that Harman was overheard by government wiretappers in conversations with a suspected Israeli intelligence agent in 2005, evidently won the judges' hearts as best team moniker.  

Sponsored by the American Council of Life Insurers, the three-mile jog draws a large congressional turnout.  It begins and ends in southeast Washington's Anacostia Park

The eight term-Democrat took the occasion to throw a road-race challenge to SpyTalk, which has taken the lead in exposing the wiretapped conversations and allegations that Bush administration officials effectively blocked FBI agents from questioning her about promises she was said to have made to the target of a FBI foreign counterintelligence operation.

Tags: AIPAC, American_Israel_Public_Affairs_Committee, CIA, espionage, Jane_Harman, Laura_Rozen, Mossad

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Intelligence Officials Tipped Pelosi To Harman Wiretap

By Jeff Stein | April 22, 2009 10:33 PM | | Comments (5)

Intelligence officials, angry that former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales had blocked an FBI investigation into Democratic Rep. Jane Harman's interactions with a suspected Israeli agent, tipped off Nancy Pelosi, the House Democratic leader, that Harman had been picked up on a court-ordered National Security Agency wiretap targeting the agent.

In doing so, the officials flouted an order by Gonzales not to inform Pelosi, three former national security officials said.

Tags: AIPAC, Alberto_Gonzales, Brendan_Daly, Bush, CIA, Congress, corruption, counterintelligence, CQ_Politics, espionage, FBI, FISA, foreign_agent, Israel, Jane_Harman, John_D._Negroponte, Nancy_Pelosi, NSA, Obama, ODNI, pay_for_play, Porter_J._Goss, Robert_S._Mueller_III, scandal, Silvestre_Reyes, Speaker_of_the_House, spying, subversion, warrantless_electronic_spying_program, White_House, wiretapping

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Source: Wiretap Caught Harman Discussing Pelosi Fundraising Flap

By Jeff Stein | April 22, 2009 12:37 PM | | Comments (2)

California Democrat Jane Harman, battling a controversy over her interactions with a suspected Israeli spy, was overheard on a 2005  wiretap discussing a failed fundraising ploy designed to get her named chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, according to a former national security official who has read the transcript.

Harman was heard lamenting to the suspected Israeli agent how the tactics of a major Jewish fundraiser to use the threat of withholding political donations to California Democrat Nancy Pelosi to win Harman the gavel of the House Select Committee on Intelligence had badly backfired, the former official said.

Tags: AIPAC, electronic surveillance, FBI, Haim_Saban, House_Intelligence_Committee, Keith_Weissman, Nancy_Pelosi, NPR, Robert_Siegel, Steve_Rosen, wiretapping

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Harman, AIPAC, NSA: What did I Know, and When Did I Know It?

By Jeff Stein | April 21, 2009 2:20 AM | | Comments (2)

The tremendous interest in my story yesterday about a 2005 NSA wiretap picking up California Democratic Rep. Jane Harman conversing with a suspected Israeli agent took me by surprise, frankly.

It's always gratifying to find so many people paying attention to things like this when Carrie Prejean is only a click away. 

The first thing I want to dispel, though, is the apparently widespread notion that the timing of my story Monday was somehow related to: (1) the upcoming trial of former AIPAC lobbyists Steve Rosen and Keith Weissman; (2) the raging debate over the NSA's warrantless wiretaps, (3) the Justice Department/CIA's torture memos; (4) anything else.

Tags: AIPAC, campaign_funds, CIA, David_Corn, Glenn_Greenwald, Huffington_Post, Jane_Harman, Keith_Weissman, NSA, Porter_J._Goss, Steve_Rosen, wiretapping

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Saudis Impotent in Battle Over Chas Freeman for Intelligence Chief

By Jeff Stein | March 10, 2009 8:03 PM | | Comments (4)

In nothing else, Chas W. Freeman's surprise surrender Tuesday shows that when it comes to U.S. national security policy, the Arabs will never trump Israel in Washington, no matter how many think tanks they fund, law firms they hire and former American diplomats they buy.

Once Freeman's name surfaced as the Obama administration's choice to head the National Intelligence Council, he was as doomed as an Afghan villager in the cross hairs of a Predator drone.

Tags: AIPAC, Chas_Freeman, China, Israel, Israeli_lobby, Jon_Chait, Kissinger, National_Intelligence_Council, Obama, realist_ideology, Robert_Dreyfuss, Schumer, The_Nation, The_New_Republic

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